Critical and Cultural Studies Public Seminar - Contested Religion, Media and Culture in India: History and Theory

This presentation will specifically deal with the history and theorisation of contested religion, media & culture in India. It will begin with a brief account of some of the early structural functionalist studies that dealt with Indian (Hindu) culture that were couched mainly in ideational terms before dealing with studies that problematized the relationship between religion, media and culture within the non-Brahman movements in Maharashtra and Tamilnadu. In the context of this latter tradition one sees the beginnings of efforts by academics to capture the role played by both the ideational and the material. It will will deal with the academic explorations of contested religion against the background of religious nationalism, the rise of the Hindutva movement and the upsurge in minority fundamentalisms.

Pradip Ninan Thomas is at the School of Communication & Arts, University of Queensland. He has written extensively on the media in India and on religion and media.